Subject: [NNTP] Chair writeup for draft-ietf-nntpext-base

From: Russ Allbery <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 23 May 2005 09:53:43 -0700

| a) Have the chairs personally reviewed this version of the Internet
|    Draft (ID), and in particular, do they believe this ID is ready
|    to forward to the IESG for publication?

Yes.  Note, however, that due to the magnitude of changes after the last
IETF Last Call, this document probably needs to go through another IETF
Last Call.

| b) Has the document had adequate review from both key WG members
|    and key non-WG members?  Do you have any concerns about the
|    depth or breadth of the reviews that have been performed?

Yes.  The document or pointers to the document have been posted several
times to news.software.nntp and have received comments and review from
many NNTP software authors.  Several NNTP software authors, including
myself, have reviewed the document for divergence from existing practice
and to ensure that its provisions are implementable and reasonable.

| c) Do you have concerns that the document needs more review from a
|    particular (broader) perspective (e.g., security, operational
|    complexity, someone familiar with AAA, etc.)?

No.

| d) Do you have any specific concerns/issues with this document that
|    you believe the ADs and/or IESG should be aware of?  For
|    example, perhaps you are uncomfortable with certain parts of the
|    document, or have concerns whether there really is a need for
|    it.  In any event, if your issues have been discussed in the WG
|    and the WG has indicated it that it still wishes to advance the
|    document, detail those concerns in the write-up.

No, I have no remaining specific concerns or issues with the document.  We
have made several compromises over the life of the working group to not
diverge too far from existing practice and to omit features that were
proposed too late in the work cycle of the working group to be seriously
considered, but I am comfortable with all of the compromises that were
reached.

| e) How solid is the WG consensus behind this document? Does it
|    represent the strong concurrence of a few individuals, with
|    others being silent, or does the WG as a whole understand and
|    agree with it?

Due to the extended lifespan of the working group, we have suffered quite
a bit of attrition and the active members of the working group are no
longer as numerous as I'd ideally prefer.  However, subject to that
caveat, I believe that we have a solid consensus among all active WG
members in favor of publication of this document.

| f) Has anyone threatened an appeal or otherwise indicated extreme
|    discontent?  If so, please summarise the areas of conflict in
|    separate email to the Responsible Area Director.

Mark Crispin has expressed strong objection to the working group's
unwillingness to remove all historical cruft from the protocol and to
change the response codes to more closely match the response code
assignment system used by other protocols such as SMTP.  I will send a
separate message explaining those disagreements and laying out why we
chose not to act on them.

| g) Have the chairs verified that the document adheres to all of the
|    ID nits? (see http://www.ietf.org/ID-Checklist.html).

Yes, I have reviewed the document against the ID checklist.

| h) Is the document split into normative and informative references?
|    Are there normative references to IDs, where the IDs are not
|    also ready for advancement or are otherwise in an unclear state?
|    (note here that the RFC editor will not publish an RFC with
|    normative references to IDs, it will delay publication until all
|    such IDs are also ready for publication as RFCs.)

Yes, the references are split.  There are no normative references to other
IDs or other unstable documents.

| j) Please provide such a write-up.  Recent examples can be found in
|    the "protocol action" announcements for approved documents.

Technical Summary

   The Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP) has been in use in the
   Internet for a decade and remains one of the most popular protocols (by
   volume) in use today.  This document is a replacement for RFC 977 and
   officially updates the protocol specification.  It clarifies some
   vagueness in RFC 977, includes some new base functionality, and
   provides a specific mechanism to add standardized extensions to NNTP.

Working Group Summary

   The NNTPEXT WG achieved consensus on this document.

Protocol Quality

   This document was reviewed by Russ Allbery, comparing it against the
   existing INN NNTP implementation.  INN intends to make the necessary
   changes to fully implement this protocol.  It has also been reviewed by
   other NNTP server and client authors in the NNTPEXT WG group and by
   participants in the news.software.nntp Usenet newsgroup.

-- 
Russ Allbery ([email-masked])             <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>